Opposing the Taliban

Washington is not impressed by Islamabad’s protestations of innocence and commitment. So, pushed hard, Pakistan army has unleashed a huge aerial attack on the Taliban in Swat. Even fighting its worst insurgencies in India – and we’ve had some big ones – the Indian army has never used helicopter gunships and heavy artillery against its own people. Free of such sensitivities, Kayani has ordered a huge pounding of suspected Taliban positions in Swat.

Nevertheless, while battering the Taliban, its also important to remember that there is a different kind of talibanisation that needs to be fought – the talibanisation of the society, of ideology. While it is certainly true that the Taliban is a multi-hued beast including the entire spectrum of common criminals and hard-core pan-Islamists, there appears to be a growing danger that the battle for the Pakistani mind could be won by Taliban. It was recently expressed by Pierre Lelouche, the French Af-Pak special envoy told Europe 1 radio: “They are nibbling away and fear is settling into people’s hearts… We shouldn’t think of columns of Taliban descending on the capital. It’s more complicated than that. We are seeing the rampant Talibanisation of areas close to the capital, a mental Talibanisation,” he warned.

But it appears that a Sunni alternative may be taking shape within Pakistan. An umbrella organisation called Sunni Tehreek, which is apparently a coming together of some 20 Sunni organisations, is slowly working its way out with the express purpose of driving out the Taliban.

Now this is interesting because the Sunni Tehreek is apparently an aggressive form of barelvis, the hitherto dominant sect in Pakistan. Pakistan was mainly Barelvi until the Zia lot abandoned them for the hardline Deobandis to create the mujahideen during the Afghan years. For instance in Karachi, the Binori and other Deobandi madrassas threw out the Barelvis, but according to Pakistani reports, Barelvis are alive and well in parts of rural Pakistan. On the other hand, the Taliban, which started out under the Deobandis have moved further and many now embrace the Wahabbi and Salafi schools. That old Barelvi-Deobandi divide is apparently coming out in the open.

At a meeting of the Sunni Tehreek this past week, it was decided they would oppose the Taliban even to the extent of an armed uprising (like Pakistan needs one more!) But this is a development worth following. They don’t relent in their opposition to the US, but using that as a starting point they are now fighting back against the Taliban. The new grouping includes the Tanzeemul Madaris Ahl-e-Sunnat, Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (Noorani), Nizam-e-Mustafa Party, Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (Nifaz-e-Shariat), Almi Tanzeem Ahl-e-Sunnat, Karwan-e-Islam, Anjuman Khuda-al-Sufia, Mustafai Tehreek, Tehreek Mashaikh Ahl-e-Sunnat, Anjuman Talba-e-Islam, Jamaat Raza-e-Mustafa, Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (Niazi), Jamaat Ahl-e-Sunnat (UK), Tahafuz Khatam-e-Nabuwat Foundation, Council of Jamaat Ahl-e-Sunnat.

It would be interesting to see how far this goes, or whether its one more of those things that are started in Pakistan for public consumption.